Help! I think I have a virus!
Like anything else in the computing world.... "Don't panic"!
My first question to you is this: why do you think you have a virus? Is something on line telling you that you have a virus? There are many virus "warnings" that are bogus. They look real. They look like they are scanning your computer and telling you that you have all sorts of vulnerabilities and they have the solution! All you have to do is buy their program! How nice of them. Truth of the matter is that a vast majority (could be even 99%) of "problems" aren't really problems. Many are simply scare tactics. Some of these web sites might actually put a virus on your computer. What makes these things even nastier is that they make it look like it is a warning from your anti-virus program, when it isn't that at all. The goal of some of these "businesses" is to scare you into buying their product. Not very nice.
What to do? For one thing, I wouldn't click on any links that are supposed to save you from destruction. Like I said, they may do more harm than good. If you really suspect you have a virus what you need to do is start the computer from a special bootable disk that is made specifically to scan for viruses. The advantage of this is that if there is a virus on your computer, starting the computer with the files on your computer may not help. But if you start the computer from a special disk, it bypasses all your files and if there is a virus, this special program won't be messed up by it.
So, once this disk starts your computer, you will have the option of scanning for viruses. That's what you want to do.
There are many such "Rescue Disks" (they may be called other things as well). Two of them are the AVG Rescue Disk and the Kaspersky Rescue Disk. I don't believe you need to be using either of these programs regularly in order to run the Rescue Disk.
Here are some links:
Download either one of these, then you'll need to burn the "iso" file to a disk, and then you'll need to start your computer from that disk. If you are not sure how to "boot" (or start) your computer from the disk you just created (sometimes it will do so automatically and sometimes it won't - depending on how your computer is set up) you can check out this link.
Please note: that when you go to the download page for AVG, (or many other web sites that have free downloads) you need to be REALLY CAREFUL about which "download" button you click. Most all of these pages are sponsored by various companies that put their items on the same page with a "Download Now" button. When you click that button, instead of getting the free program you are trying to download you end up downloading something else. Just be careful where you click.
There you go. Give it a try. You'll need to learn these procedures sooner or later, so you might as well give it an attempt now.
For more information about virus protection, see my "security" page.
For an article at pcworld.com about a fake antivirus attack, click here.
My first question to you is this: why do you think you have a virus? Is something on line telling you that you have a virus? There are many virus "warnings" that are bogus. They look real. They look like they are scanning your computer and telling you that you have all sorts of vulnerabilities and they have the solution! All you have to do is buy their program! How nice of them. Truth of the matter is that a vast majority (could be even 99%) of "problems" aren't really problems. Many are simply scare tactics. Some of these web sites might actually put a virus on your computer. What makes these things even nastier is that they make it look like it is a warning from your anti-virus program, when it isn't that at all. The goal of some of these "businesses" is to scare you into buying their product. Not very nice.
What to do? For one thing, I wouldn't click on any links that are supposed to save you from destruction. Like I said, they may do more harm than good. If you really suspect you have a virus what you need to do is start the computer from a special bootable disk that is made specifically to scan for viruses. The advantage of this is that if there is a virus on your computer, starting the computer with the files on your computer may not help. But if you start the computer from a special disk, it bypasses all your files and if there is a virus, this special program won't be messed up by it.
So, once this disk starts your computer, you will have the option of scanning for viruses. That's what you want to do.
There are many such "Rescue Disks" (they may be called other things as well). Two of them are the AVG Rescue Disk and the Kaspersky Rescue Disk. I don't believe you need to be using either of these programs regularly in order to run the Rescue Disk.
Here are some links:
Download either one of these, then you'll need to burn the "iso" file to a disk, and then you'll need to start your computer from that disk. If you are not sure how to "boot" (or start) your computer from the disk you just created (sometimes it will do so automatically and sometimes it won't - depending on how your computer is set up) you can check out this link.
Please note: that when you go to the download page for AVG, (or many other web sites that have free downloads) you need to be REALLY CAREFUL about which "download" button you click. Most all of these pages are sponsored by various companies that put their items on the same page with a "Download Now" button. When you click that button, instead of getting the free program you are trying to download you end up downloading something else. Just be careful where you click.
There you go. Give it a try. You'll need to learn these procedures sooner or later, so you might as well give it an attempt now.
For more information about virus protection, see my "security" page.
For an article at pcworld.com about a fake antivirus attack, click here.